The number of yarn supply bobbins associated with a circular knitting machine may number from thirty to over one hundred. Particularly when the fabric being knitted is made from cotton yarn, the fiber waste generated by engagement between the yarn and the yarn feeding and guiding devices of the knitting machine is quite substantial. The fiber waste problem is further aggravated by the fact that knitting machines tend to be operated at increasingly faster speeds, which increases the rate at which fiber waste is generated.
After the fiber waste has become airborne, it may settle upon the yarn feeding and guiding devices or other components of the knitting section of the knitting machine where it was generated, or upon one or more neighboring machines. This increases the possibility of yarn breakage, defective stitch formation, and other undesirable results that adversely affect the quality of the knitted fabric.
Previously proposed apparatuses for removing fiber waste from circular knitting machines have employed fans or air blowers located above the machines. However, these merely displace the fiber waste from one location to another, and do not collect the same. It has also been proposed to enclose each of the knitting machines in a curtain-like sheet, and to provide adjacent each machine an exhaust duct into which a machine operator may introduce the fiber waste generated by the machine and collected by the operator. Providing separate exhaust ducts in association with each of the knitting machines would be quite expensive, however. Additionally, the curtain-like sheets limit access to the knitting machines, and rapidly become unsanitary due to adherence of lint, oil, dirt and the like to them.